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Best Five Journal Who Am I Wisdom

Top Ten Books Challenge

One of the first Bibles in English
One of the first Bibles in English

My wife challenged me on Facebook to list the top ten books that have influenced my life. I don’t necessarily take up every Facebook fad. But this one I consider a very thoughtful and potentially helpful exercise. One of the proverbs I heard along the way is “Leaders are readers!”   I agree totally. This challenge is also in keeping with one of the goals of my blog, to record the books I have read and comment on them. So here goes:

 

The Holy Bible – KJV Thompson Chain Reference.   I was given this for Christmas by my parents when I was about 12 years old. It represents the Bible-learning culture in which I was raised. It was my earliest textbook for studying the Bible. I still treasure it and use it occasionally.

The Holy Bible – NIV 1984. This version of the Bible became the translation that I read day after day, the version that molded my mindset and helped me communicate the Gospel to a generation that had never heard of King James of England, nor did they understand his language. Now I read and use the 2011 NIV since I follow the Reformation principle that the Bible must be in the language of the people. But the 1984 version will always be in my heart.

Growing Spiritually – E. Stanley Jones. I was in seminary, I think, when I read this devotional classic. I was captured and challenged by the practical Wesleyan theology, poignant illustration from life, and excellent thinking by one who has become one of my favorite devotional writers. This book prompted a definite step forward in my own spiritual growth.

Developing the Leaders around You – John C. Maxwell.   During my first pastorate I began to be mentored by the speaking and writing of John Maxwell. I didn’t know how much I needed it. I now have a dozen of his books that I have read and I still consider this one among his very best. I also have a shelf full of others on the topic of leadership. This book started me on a whole different journey of not just doing well myself, but enabling others to do well. This intentional focus as well as trying to teach church leaders to do the same has added untold dimensions to my ministry and extended its effectiveness many years. It has enabled me to be a factor in launching or enhancing the ministry of many others too.

Communication: Key to Your Marriage – H. Norman Wright.  With this book there was a companion volume The Pillars of Your Marriage.  They were not deep, but they were practical. They were intended for class use and included discussion questions too. I interacted with these books and other similar ones at a time in our marriage when I desperately needed to learn more about how to have a successful marriage. They were very helpful both to me personally and in my ministry over the years to others.

Secrets of the Vine – Bruce Wilkinson. Sometimes you are looking for books that will prod spiritual renewal in your life. This is such a book. I have now read the book at least three times. The first time I read it, I wrote in the cover, “I finished this book today…it was a life-changing experience.”

The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership – John C. Maxwell.   This is John Maxwell’s classic. It has helped me immensely to understand leadership and learn to practice it. I am still learning and growing.   This book confirmed for me that leadership is one of the three most essential areas of understanding/preparation needed by pastors. (The other two are preaching/teaching and counseling/personal work.)

Fresh Faith – Jim Cymbala. One of the areas I needed to grow spiritually as a pastor was faith. Reading Jim Cymbala’s testimony-laced books is one of the ways God has helped me to do that. It is challenging and inspiring to read what God is doing at Brooklyn Tabernacle and it makes one pray for greater faith.

Just Walk Across the Room – Bill Hybels. Another of the great mentors for pastors today is Bill Hybels. This book is among his best. It is such a practical and everyday approach to reaching other people for Jesus.   I think it is evangelism as it was meant to be. It has helped me to look for opportunities daily to be a blessing for Jesus’ sake.

The Purpose Drive Church – Rick Warren.   I had already been a pastor for 15 years when I read this book. I immediately said that it was the best book on how to do church that I had ever read. As far as I am concerned, it has not had a rival until Andy Stanley’s Deep and Wide came out in 2012.  Warren helped me to understand that discipleship was crucial and that I needed to help people step by step to move closer to the church as a part of their spiritual journey.

I’ve read so many books over the years that I can’t be sure I haven’t missed one somewhere. I reduced my library by more than half when I moved in 2013 and I still have four floor-to-ceiling bookshelves full in my office. I have tried to choose books for my top ten that represented important areas of reading. The best books often prompt us to read more by the same author or more in that subject area. All of these books have done that. And I keep buying new books and reading more.    I admit that the time I now spend on social media has cut into my reading time, but it has not eliminated it. I am still completing new books! How about you?

 

 

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Americana Journal Joy Notes Who Am I

A Maple Syrupy Memory

Diorama of wooden gathering tank on sled
Diorama showing horses pulling the gathering tank
Diorama of sap shanty in the woods
Collection of wooden sap buckets from 19th century
Collection of wooden spials
Diorama of pre-internal combustion sawmill
Diorama of lumbering in the 19th century

[Show as slideshow]

On the last day of our recent week of vacation, my wife and I stopped at a Maple Syrup Museum on Route 7 just north of Rutland, Vermont.  It was a fascinating stop for me as it brought back many childhood memories.   The museum contains many artifacts from the production of maple syrup in the late 19th and 20th centuries.  An entire wall mural was dedicated to telling the story of the production of syrup by the Native Americans of New England before settlers arrived.  This fascinating dimension of the history of the maple syrup industry was new to me and I was glad to see it featured prominently.  One of the most captivating displays was a hand-carved diorama depicting the gathering of maple sap using a team of horses and a sled with gathering tank on top.   In the same diorama is a representation of a sap-boiling shanty in the woods.  The first 3 pictures above are of this diorama.    The last two pictures are from an even bigger diorama depicting lumbering before tractor power.  The museum is a great stop for maple lovers and those who remember making syrup.

I have a very early childhood memory of assisting in the gathering of sap on the top of the hill above Twin Elms Farm.   Deep in the woods plot, there was an old shed devoted to boiling sap in the spring. My father and grandfather had traded the horses for a tractor the year I was born.   But, for the spring that I remember, it was too muddy in the woods to use the tractor for gathering sap.  Early tractors were not the behemoths we are used to today.    So my grandfather and father made arrangements to borrow a team of horses and use them to pull the sled and gathering tank.    I remember riding the sled with its metal gathering tank on top from the house up to the top of the hill and into the woods.   I recall the old wooden tank next to the boiling shed into which the gathered sap was dumped from the gathering tank.    I remember the old arch, as it was called, inside the shed.   It was simply two rows of concrete blocks, just wide enough apart to fit the large pans on the top.   The two pans were placed end to end on the arch.    The long slabs or poles of wood we burned were inserted into the arch underneath the pans at one end. The fire and heat traveled the length of the two pans– which must’ve been 10-12 feet — and the smoke exited through a stack at the far end.    The freshest sap was inserted in the pan nearest the chimney, the cooler one; the boiled-down syrup was removed from the first pan, the hotter one.   We did not use wooden buckets, as the diorama pictures, but galvanized metal ones instead.

This old syrup shanty on the hill was deserted before many years had passed.    After that, my father continued boiling sap on a smaller scale in a single pan over a smaller arch.   I remember helping and  trying to keep it clean and light colored.    I have many other memories that go with the traditions of maple syrup making at Twin Elms Farm too.   I remember loving to drink the sap straight from the tree.   I would go down to the maple tree in the front lawn and tip the sap bucket to get a drink.   There was just a hint of delicious flavored sweetness.

After the sap had been boiled down in the pans over the arches, my mom would “finish off” the syrup over the kitchen stove.    I don’t remember seeing it happen, but I was told that sometimes this released so much moisture that the wallpaper had come loose.   She poured milk into the syrup to help boil out the impurities.    I sometimes tasted the creamy, foamy skimmings, though I don’t think Mom approved of that.    I remember each year we would have a contest at stirring maple sugar.   Mom would boil down some syrup even further until it was just the right consistency for making sugar candy.  I think it was right when it would spin a hair from the spoon.     Then she would ladle it into bowls and we would begin stirring our bowlful.   The faster you stirred, the lighter colored and finer textured your sugar would be.   That was the goal.    Of course, the most delightful part was eating it.   I preferred eating it while it was soft and still do.   JoAnne learned about stirring maple sugar while she was dating me. She learned to love eating it too and still does, much more than me. I bought her some at the museum.

At the Vermont museum they had taste samples of different grades of maple syrup.  I checked them out!    I remember during maple syrup season on the farm, once in a while, Mom would serve us a small dish of maple syrup for dessert– nothing with it — just served to eat with the spoon.   I loved it and I still can eat maple syrup by itself.    Mom also prepared syrup for us to pour on snow if the weather made snow available.  This was also a delightful candy treat. We called it wax.

The museum had maple cream to sample also, which is the most delicious stuff ever, but correspondingly expensive.     As we left the museum, JoAnne and I just wanted to find a restaurant that served pancakes with the real thing—maple syrup—for a topping!  At home, we never ate pancakes any other way.

Categories
Journal Who Am I

My home church in Haskinville, NY

I can easily recognize both of my grandfathers in this old photo
I can easily recognize both of my grandfathers in this old photo

(I found this version of the story of my home church’s influence on my life while reviewing an old sermon.  This vignette was part of the introduction to a 2005 sermon.)

Where I grew up it was ten miles to the nearest bank or full-sized grocery store.  The hamlet that our family considered home was about seventeen houses and we lived almost 2 miles outside of town..  Like many rural hamlets it had formerly had a couple stores, a gun shop  and a cheese factory.  But by the time I grew up all that was left was a small convenience type store and a saw mill, both barely holding on.  Dad would buy us Fawn orange soda at the store on the way to the infrequent night bass fishing expeditions.   The hamlet had no fire department.  The only organization in town was the small country Wesleyan church.  It was a 19th century clapboard building with no rest rooms.   It held about 100 people when there was standing room only.    I’ve seen it that full a couple times for Christmas and Easter programs.  But usually it was the Sunday morning gathering place of about 55 souls, a generous percentage of them children like me.  Since most of the people were farmers and didn’t go anywhere,  those fifty-some souls were usually present almost the whole 50 Sundays per year that the church was open.  (It usually closed two weeks for camp meeting.)  The local historians told us that there had been a Wesleyan church in that town for almost a hundred years already when I was a boy.   Pastors came and went frequently over the years.  Most were good men, but at least one some 40 years before had caused a scandal which was still used as an excuse to stay away by the less religious in the village.

As I reflect back, I think of the many ways that little church had shaped my life.  The shaping had started long before I was born.  Years before,  a traveling evangelist had come through and my Grandfather, Homer Jones, became a Christian.   The Jones family had farmed in that town since the civil war. My maternal grandfather, Samuel Isaman, was a new-comer to that town having bought a farm about 1920.   He was of Lutheran background.  When his only daughter, Dorothy, was deathly sick with pneumonia he knelt in the cow stable and prayed for her.  She recovered and  he dedicated himself to serve God faithfully in that little country church.   So my parents met at Sunday School where they remember seeking to outdo each other in childhood Sunday School contests.

So, I am told, I was taken to that little church when I was only days old.  I grew up in the habit of going to church and Sunday school on Sunday.  Sunday in that town was the Lord’s day.  Very few people worked on that day except for the daily farm chores.   In that little church I learned that the Bible was God’s truth, the guidebook for our lives and the roadmap to heaven.  I learned that love and forgiveness, charity and honesty were virtues because they were God-like.   I discovered that being unselfish was the  true measure of spirituality and that it wasn’t easy because self-centeredness came much more naturally.   I valued reading and music and speaking because they were part of church.  I learned many Bible verses by heart there and they still come back to me.

Looking back, that little church was responsible for so much of who I am.  And I wasn’t the only one similarly shaped.  The little place can boast a whole line of spiritual leaders over several decades who grew up there.   Long before large churches with snappy mission statements were the vogue, it seemed to know how to teach us to love God and love others and it made disciples.

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Journal News Commentary

Incisive thinking on the benefits and challenges of higher education

For all of you interested in the philosophy of education and the climate of education in our country today, here is a great article by Dr. Shirley Mullen, President of Houghton College.   She is a critical yet positive thinker.   http://www.ecampusnews.com/top-news/higher-education-examination-429/.

 

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Journal

My niece is an excellent blogger

I occasionally get to read my niece’s blog called County Road 21.   Michelle Jones Bushnell is an excellent writer, but that is only the beginning.  She is thoughtful, occasionally hilarious (read the recent post, For Sale, I’m still laughing), and refreshing honest.   I heartily recommend her blog and I’m putting the link in my blogroll too.  Check it out!

http://countyroad21.com/

 

Categories
Journal Joy Notes Wisdom

Treasures on today’s walk

There is always a bright spot if you are looking for one.
There is always a bright spot if you are looking for one.

This afternoon I took a walk up Broad Hill Road and on up the hill.  I turned left into the Holcombe Farm trails and took the High Ridge Trail.   I wasn’t feeling tops, but I have found that pushing myself to walk when I am not feeling spunky often helps me in the long run. There was not a lot to see in the early spring woods. I had to watch my footing as the trail was muddy in places from small springs.   But I had my trusty hiking staff to keep me steady.   I always keep my eyes open and today I was especially looking for spring flowers. After all, it is May and the old adage says, “April showers bring May flowers.”    I was not disappointed.   On my way to the woods, I had seen red trilliums in two different gardens but I did not find any yet in the woods.     However I did find a beautiful little rock garden type plant growing in the path and among the mosses.  It seemed to be a more dainty version of a plant I had recently planted in my own rock garden.

I was nearly back to the beginning of the High Ridge Trail when I almost stumbled over a fallen but still intact bird’s nest.  It was too small to be a robin’s nest, built of different materials, and more neatly built too.   I wasn’t sure if the white material in it was some kind of fine bark or lichen.    I took its picture to record another find of interest on my path.   Finds like this are why I prefer outside walks to inside treadmills any day, even though I might get rained on occasionally as I did today before I got home.

A well built nest at the base of a tall forest oak
A well built nest at the base of a tall forest oak

I guess my walk is another illustration of how we seem to find things of interest if we are alert and looking.   Just becoming an observer of nature would cure boredom for many people, I’m quite sure.   I derive so much pleasure on my walks from observing different aspects of the natural world that I have taken time over the years to learn a little about –rocks, trees, birds, wildflowers, ferns, mushrooms, and animals all provide something fascinating regularly.    I’m afraid many people don’t notice much.  I haven’t always either.

I think the habit of looking for interesting and beautiful things in nature helps us also to get in the habit of looking for good things in all of life.      We all know that if we look for trouble, we find it; and if we look for good things, we will find them too.   Noticing things we can rejoice and give thanks for gives us a healthy sense of anticipation and keeps our spirits up every day.

“Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows” (Jas 1:17 NIV).

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Journal Joy Notes

A walk today

A beautiful bird
A beautiful bird

 

I took a walk both yesterday and today on the rail trail south from Copper Hill Road.  Today, company was sparse, and what there was were mostly bicycle riders.   One of the joys of the walking pace is seeing more of what is happening in nature.  Yesterday I noticed a flock of birds in the blow-down area of the swamp and stopped to watch.  One looks a little odd staring off into the swamp without binoculars and sure enough, someone going by asked me what I saw out there.  I  responded that there was a flock of beautiful warblers.   At the time, I couldn’t remember the identity, but I got a close enough view of one or two so I could look them up when I returned home.    Today I looked them up — yellow-rumped warblers.   The male is among the most colorful of our Northeastern birds.   I went back today with my binoculars and found the flock or a similar one a little farther south along the trail in a more wooded area.   The bonus this time was catching a glimpse of a blue-gray gnat-catcher at work in the same area.   There were plenty of gnats so he was living up to his name.

Reptiles have awakened for the summer
Reptiles have awakened for the summer

The reptiles are out now too.  Last week JoAnne and I saw a garter snake on our walk up Broad Hill Road extension.   Today I snapped this picture of a turtle sunning himself with a bullfrog poking his nose out a little behind him. I needed my camera with some zoom.   But at least my phone camera is nearly always with me.

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Americana Journal

A family memory

Family memories are often attached to old vehicles
Family memories are often attached to old vehicles

This antique Packard belongs to Steve, a neighbor of mine.   It reminds me of a story my Mom used to tell.  When she was a girl, probably a young teen, she was taught to drive a car in order to help on the farm.  He father instructed her how to pull hay up into the mow with it.  I think it was a Maxwell.   Cars in the 1920’s, the era this car is from, were often put to work on the farm.  I’ve heard stories (I can’t remember where) of a rear tire being removed from an old car and a belt somehow put on to drive a saw.  Steve found an original engine for this car in another old Packard that had been used as a tractor.   Much of the interior work on this car is leather.  Steve pointed out that many parts were hand-made, not mass-produced in that era.

 

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Church Leadership Journal Joy Notes

You can help Houghton College today!

Houghton LogoMy favorite college is having a one day campaign to enlist support.  It’s a two-way matching grant opportunity.   In this day when most college education neglects character, Houghton mentors students by example and curriculum design to become servant leaders in today’s world.    Many college graduates are having a hard time getting work, but at Houghton the situation is different.  They were recently recognized for outstanding success with STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) graduates. “The success rate for STEM studies has proven to be true at Houghton College where over the past five years, 100 percent of  graduates who obtained degrees in chemistry, biochemistry, physics, math, and computer science have obtained jobs in their desired field of study within six months of graduating from Houghton or gone on to Ph.D. or master’s degree programs.”   (http://www.houghton.edu/news-media/recent-news/houghton-graduates-excel-in-stem-fields-compared-to-other-colleges/377/) If you would like to help students at a college like that, I invite you to participate in this one day of giving.  Both your gift and your presence among the givers will make a difference.  I very seldom put fund-raising things on my blog.  There are just too many available.  But today I am making an exception for a great cause. All gifts made today toward the Student Scholarship Fund will be matched dollar-for-dollar up to $150,000. In addition, if 500 donors make a gift today to scholarships or any other projects across campus, Houghton will receive a gift of $100,000. Visit www.houghton.edu to donate today.

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Journal Joy Notes

Signs of spring

redwing.

This has been a long winter here in the Northeast.  My friends back in Syracuse are having one of those kind where you don’t see the grass from November ’til April, I hear.   I remember at least one of those.   Here we are just now seeing it again for the first time since about the end of January.   We had more than 20 inches of snow on the ground which hardened and stayed forever.

But spring is coming, albeit too slowly for most of us.  Two days ago on my walk on the rail trail north from Copper Hill Rd. I saw a couple red-winged blackbirds and a pair of mallard ducks.  Today I saw a pair of song sparrows and as I drove away past the local dog kennel, two beautiful male bluebirds flew in front of me.   Spring is definitely on its way!